Buddhism: Religious Movements - Delhi Police Constable PDF Download

Buddhism
 Causes of New Movement

• The Vedic philosophy had lost its original purity.
• The Vedic religion had become very complex and degenerated into superstitions, dogmas, and rituals.
• The supremacy of the Brahmanas created unrest in the society.
• Vedic sacrifices were very complicated and a source of wastage of time and money.
• The Kshatriya reaction against the domination of the Brahmanas.
• All the religious treatises were written in Sanskrit which was the language of the elite and not the masses.
• Introduction of a new agricultural economy in north-eastern India.
• The desire of Vaishyas to improve their social position with the increase in their economic position due to the growth of trade.

Life

• Gautama, the Buddha also known as: Siddharta, Sakyamuni and Thathagata.
• Born: in 563 B.C. (widely accepted), on the vaisakha purnima day at Lumbini, near Kapilvastu, capital of the Sakya republic.
• Left home at the age of 29 and attained Nirvana at the age of 35 at Bodh Gaya.
• Buddha delivered his first sermon at Sarnath.
• He attained mahaparinirvana at Kusinara in 483 B.C.

Buddhist Philosophy

• Idealism: Two source of valid knowledge (a) Perception and (b) Inference.
• Doctrine of dependent origination (Pratiyasamutpada) : Central theory of Buddhist philosophy. It tells that in the empirical world dominated by the intellect everything is relative, conditional, dependent, subject to birth and death and therefore impermanent.
• Theory of momentariness (Impermanence): Kshanabhanga. It tells that  everything in this world is  merely conglomeration of perishable qualities. Again it says that only that thing can produce effect which has existence and whatever can not produce effect has no existence.

Buddhist Councils

• The First Council was held in 483 B.C. at Sattapanni cave near Rajagriha to compile the Dhamma Pitaka and Vinaya Pitaka.
• The Second Council was held at Vaisali in or about 383 B.C. The monks of Vaisali wanted some change in the rules in respect of the ten points. Schism of the Buddhists into Sthaviravadins and Mahasangikas.
  

Know The Important Facts

• The Pali works mention that, at the time of Buddha, there existed no less than sixty-two different sects. According to the Jain texts, their number was 363.
• The important among these were the Ajivikas, Jatilakas, Munda-Savakas, Parivrajakas, Mangandikas, Gotamakas, Tendikas etc.
• The most important teachers of the time, besides the Buddha, and Mahavira, were: Purana-Kassapa, Makkhali-Gosala, Nigantha Nataputta, Ajita-Kesakambalin, Pakuddha Kacchayana, Sanjaya-Belathaputta.
• The Third Council was held at Pataliputra during the reign of Ashoka, 236 years after the death of Buddha. It was held under the Presidentship of MoggliputtaTissa to revise the scriptures.
• The Fourth Council was held during the reign of Kanishka in Kashmir under the Presidentship of Vasumitra and Asvaghosha and resulted in the division of Buddhists into Mahayanists and Hinayanists.

Buddhist Scriptures

• The Vinaya Pitaka: 
  (a) mainly deals with rules and regulations which the Buddha promulgated. 
  (b) It describes in detail the gradual development of the Sangha. 
  (c) An account of the life and teaching of the Buddha is also given.
• The Sutta Pitaka: 
  (a) Consists chiefly of discourses delivered by Buddha himself on different occasions. 
  (b) Few discourses delivered by Sariputta, Ananda, Moggalana and others are also included in it. 
  (c) It lays down the principles of religion.
• The Abhidhamma Pitaka: 
  (a) Contains the profound philosophy of the Buddha’s teachings. 
  (b) It investigates mind and matter, to help the understanding of things as they truly are.
• The Khandhakas contain regulations on the course of life in the monastic order and have two sections—the Mahavagga and the Cullavagga. The third part the Parivara an insignificant composition by a Ceylonese monk, is a manual of instruction about the contents of the Vinaya Pitaka.
• The Sutta Pitaka is divided into five Nikayas (groups)
  (a) The Digha Nikaya “long collection”, comprises 34 long suttas. Of these the sixteenth, the Mahaparinibbana Sutta, is the most important and gives us information on the last few days of the Buddha.
  (b) The Majjhima Nikaya, “collection of middle sized reports on instructions”, contains 152 suttas.
  (c) The Samyutta Nikaya, “collection of instructions divided into groups”, contains 56 groups of the suttas.
  (d) The Anguttara Nikaya, “by one-limb-more collection”, is divided into 11 chapters; here the suttas are so arranged that the first chapter deals with things which occur only once, the second with those which occur twice and so on.
  (e) The Khuddaka Nikaya, “collection of little pieces”, contains texts of a diverse character which are scatered literary works. The foremost among the pieces of the Khuddaka Nikaya is the Khuddakapatha which is only a small prayer-book.
• The Udana is a collection of impassioned utterances of the Buddha.  The Itivuttaka “thus has been said”, comprises maxims spoken by the Buddha to his disciples. The Patisambhidamagga, which deals with knowledge, belongs to the Abhidhamma literature in view of its contents. 

Know The Important Facts

• In the Pali texts the Gamabhojaka appears as a tyrant who fleeces the people with arbitrary exactions and sometimes interferes with the autonomous and associate life of the village.
• The Buddha extended the teaching of two elder contemporaries, Alara of an Aryan Kalama tribe, and Uddaka, son of Rama.
• Buddhism believes in non-self, no god, no soul or spirit.
• There is no authority in Buddhism.
• There is very little theological or philosophical speculation involved in Buddhism.
• Buddhism is scientific in approach, a search for cause and effect relationships and a knowledge of reality as it is experienced by each individual human being.
• Buddhism is psychological in approach, is that it begins with human beings rather than with the universe.
• “The different schools are constantly at variance, and their utterances rise like angry waves of the sea. There are 18 schools, each claiming pre-eminence.”
• — Hien-Tsang on Buddhist Schools
• “If women was not admitted into the monasteries, Buddhism would have continued for thousand of years, but because this admission has been granted it would last only five hundred years”

Roots of Buddhism in the Past

• The Vedanta
• Sankhya philosophy
• The Upanishads: Their ideas about karma, soul, rebirth, moksha, ahimsa etc. has been inspired by the Upanishads.

Four Noble Truths

• The world is full of sorrows.
• Desire is the cause of sorrow.
• If desire are conquered, all sorrows can be removed.
• Desire can be removed by following the eight fold path.

Eight Fold Path

• Right understanding   
• Right thought
• Right speech   
• Right action
• Right livelihood
• Right effort
• Right mindfulness
• Right concentration

Three Ratna or Jewels of Buddhism

• Buddha
• Dhamma
• Sangha.

Five Great Events of Buddha’s Life and their Symbols

• Birth: Lotus and Bull
• Great Renunciation: Horse
• Nirvana: Bodhi tree
• First Sermon—Dharmachakra or wheel
• Parinirvana or Death—Stupa

Famous Bhikhus at the Time of Buddha

• Sariputta, possessed the profoundest insight into the dhamma.
• Moggalana, had the greatest super-natural powers.
• Ananda, the devoted disciple and constant companion of the Buddha.
• Maha Kassapa, the President of the Buddhist Council held at Rajagriha
• Anuruddha, master of right mindfulness
• Upali, master of vinaya and
• Rahul, the Buddha’s son.

younger monks and nuns who have attained the position of arhats. The Buddhavamsa is a legend in verse, which narrates the life and activities of the 24 Buddhas, who preceded Gautama. Among the non-canonical literature Milindapanho, Dipavamsa and Mahavamsa are important. 
The later two are the great chronicles of Ceylon. Sutta Nipatta and the four Nikayas say regarding people and caste, countries and towns, brahmins, and sacrifice of the period. Digha Nikaya contains discourses by the Buddha and other monks. They contain parables, similes, and anecdotes giving sociological datas, descriptions, objective observations and religious advice. 
Anguttara Nikaya is mainly concerned with numerical categorisation. Majjihima Nikaya contains religious and philisophical controversies. It also deals with the brahmanic claim to social and ritual superiority. Samutta Nikaya deals with the behaviour of groups and individuals and also the discourses they have with Buddha and with one another. 
Sutta Pitaka is a collection of verses containing religious doctrine.  Shippikani or coury shells are once mentioned in Jataka. The Masaka, the Pava, the Kakanika, and the Kamasa were the bronze or copper tokens. 
During the period the flexibility of a market economy was facilitated by three innovations; the use of a script, the consequent issuing of promissory notes, the letters of credit and pledges, and the introduction money in the form of silver and copper punch-marked coins.

Know The Important Facts

• Asvaghosha—Contemporary of Kanishka. He was a poet, dramatist, musician, scholar and debator. He took Buddhism to every heart and home
• Nagarjuna—He was a friend and contemporary of the Satavahana king Yajnasri Gautamiputra of Andhra. He propounded the Madhyamika school of Buddhist philosophy popularly known as Sunyavada.
• Asanga and Vasubandhu—Who were brothers, flourished in the Punjab in the fourth century A.D. Asanga was the most important teacher of the Yogacara or Vijnanavada school founded by his guru, Maitreyanatha.
• Vasubandhu’s greatest work, the Abhidharmakosa is still considered an important encyclopaedia of Buddhism.
• Buddhaghosha—Who lived in the fifth century A.D. was a great Pali scholar. The commentaries and the Visuddhimaga written by him are a great achievement in the Post-Tripitaka literature.
• Buddhapalita and Bhavariveka—were important exponents, in the fifth century, of the Sunyavada doctrine propounded by Nagarjuna.
• Dinnaga—The last mighty intellectual of the fifth century, is well known as the founder of the Buddhist logic.
• Dharmakirti—lived in the seventh century A.D. was another great Buddhist logician. He was a subtle philosophical thinker and dialectician.